Seminar Title: Noninvasive deep brain stimulation with focused ultrasonic waves
When
Abstract:
Mental and neurological circuits affect neural circuits situated deep in the brain. It has been difficult to modulate and reset these circuits in an effective and scalable way. To address this long-standing issue, my group has developed approaches and devices for noninvasive and circuit-directed treatments based on transcranial focused ultrasound. The approaches feature two innovations that enable effective and safe deep brain neuromodulation in humans. First, the hardware maximizes the radiation forces associated with the ultrasound and thus its neuromodulatory effects. And second, the devices directly measure and compensate for the attenuation and distortions of ultrasound by the head and hair.
Together, the hardware provides controlled and deterministic delivery of ultrasound into specified deep brain targets. Applying the devices to patients, we have demonstrated a rapid reduction in tremor amplitude, following several seconds of low-intensity stimulation of the ventral intermediate nucleus. In addition, we have shown rapid and sustained improvements in symptoms of chronic pain. And finally, we have demonstrated over 50% improvements in symptoms of major depression. These new approaches and devices open exciting new opportunities for treatments of mental and neurological disorders, for systematic guidance of existing treatments, and for causal brain mapping.
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Bio:
Dr. Kubanek has obtained his PhD in Biomedical Engineering from Washington University in St. Louis, and trained in ultrasound-based therapies at Stanford. He received the K99/R00 award to initiate his work at the University of Utah, where he built hardware for noninvasive modulation of the brain with focused ultrasound.
His lab has obtained grants from the NIH, NSF, Wellcome Leap, the Focused Ultrasound Foundation, and the technology transfer office to develop the hardware and bring it into translation in humans. The devices are being applied to modulate the deep brain regions involved in essential tremor, chronic pain, depression, and opioid addiction. Future work will apply the technology in large-scale clinical studies and also use it for causal mapping of brain function.